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Thursday, July 5, 2012

Q) How many Owners actually live on the property?
A) Not many (about 16%).
As of 4/9/12 of the 168 units only 27 have Homestead Exemptions (HE's) so the stats on that show an Owner Occupancy figure to be 16%. 

This isn't absolute of course, there are 2 Owners showing with a HE that are being foreclosed on and are gone from the property but balancing it out with other 'new' Owners whose HE's haven't had time to come into effect. 
So 16% Owner occupancy is probably pretty close to correct.

We are about 80% rentals, 16% Owner Occupied and 4% empty (mostly foreclosed and awaiting sale).


Note:  of the 80% rentals, 33% are accounted for by the 56 Developer units and the other 47% are rentals by Owners.
There is a growing trend for buyers to pick up bank foreclosures/short sales at rock bottom prices and then rent them out as income producing properties.  This works out fine if you purchase at 45-50% of the original sale price and you can make some money renting out such units.  It dosen't work out nearly as well for those owners who paid full price before the housing bubble burst.  The $800-1,000 they bring in monthly might not even be enough to pay the mortgage each month, let alone the condo fees, taxes and insurance.

So those who purchased here thinking they would be living in a community of other owners and enjoying retirement have found that they are owners in an apartment complex.  Not really what they had in mind in 2005-08 when they decided to buy here.  New owners will continue to replace old owners and the complex will probably continue to be about 80% rentals.